Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize • Hacker News Board

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#711

Post by tehjoker » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 4:31 AM UTC

ajross wrote: post #513

tehjoker wrote: post #459

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Workers need to be willing to break the law in order to win victories against the people that make the laws. Employers aren't even the law, this is such a small thing and is defensible. I don't see a reason to side with Google at all, if they really vociferously disagreed, they could ask her to remove the notification.

> Workers need to be willing to break the law in order to win victories against the people that make the laws. Not if they want to win, they don't. Anarchism won nothing at the turn of the century. Organized (note the adjective!) Labor broke through when it became a political movement with representation in government.

You should comply with laws that are justifiable and not with laws that are unjustifiable and represent petty authoritarianism. The working class can tell the difference. I 100% agree that organized resistance is key. Individualized resistance just earns a beat down.

I disagree that only rights granted by courts are effective in winning labor struggles. Strikes, legal or not, are required for advancing labor's cause.

This worker was attempting to organize her colleagues in an extremely tame way. There was no property damage. We should show our unadulterated support to embolden the working class.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#712

Post by ThrowawayR2 » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:04 AM UTC

fzeroracer wrote: post #403

tdfx wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love that a site full of engineers is pretending that getting a pull request approved by colleagues is the same thing as getting management's approval for a new, most likely controversial feature. Google is clearly trying to squash union organizing at the company but let's not pretend this employee was correct in her actions. Google being evil and this employee being in the wrong are not mutually exclusive.

The employee was not correct in doing her legal obligation to inform people of their right to organize in an app designed to inform employees about various rights and things as they browse the web? Which she had the authority to do because it's literally what she was hired to do? Can you explain how this makes the employee wrong if they follow the law and their company fires them for doing so?

> "The employee was not correct in doing her legal obligation to inform people of their right to organize..."

The corporation as an entity has the legal obligation to inform people of their right to organize. The corporation has designated specific people with the appropriate expertise and authority as those permitted to do so. Said group does not include this individual. End of story.

> "Which she had the authority to do because it's literally what she was hired to do?"

This individual is a legal or HR specialist with expertise in US labor law and knowledge of approved mechanisms for complying with said laws? No? How odd it is, then, that people are claiming that is what she was "hired to do" despite having no qualifications or permission to to do so.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#713

Post by ThrowawayR2 » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:11 AM UTC

tehjoker wrote: post #710

ThrowawayR2 wrote: post #707

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> " Workers need to be willing to break the law in order to win victories against the people that make the laws... " Like most of the general public, I have no desire to associate with criminals. If you build your union on a foundation of illegal acts, there's no reason for anyone to believe you'll stop once it gets fully established. Existing unions in the United States provide ample proof of that.

When workers organize and attempt to make demands greater than than the bosses are willing accede to, the bosses call in the police, private security, and depending on the political climate, right wing street fighters to start cracking heads. For a famous example of a dual power situation consider the 1934 Minneapolis teamsters' strike. https://teamster.org/about/teamster-history/1934

Even setting aside the obvious "Two wrongs do not make a right" response, if you have to cite history from 3/4 of a century ago, well...good luck persuading people with that. On the other hand, the public can easily find news stories of major corruption and criminal involvement by unions for each of the past few decades.

(Oh, and by the way, the Teamsters, whose site you linked to, figure prominently in quite a number of those news stories. There really isn't a better example I can think of of why "Workers need to be willing to break the law in order to win victories against the people that make the laws..." goes down a bad path than them. The Wikipedia article for them contains the word "corrupt" 31 times.)

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#714

Post by fargle » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:26 AM UTC

hechang1997 wrote: post #508

tanilama wrote: post #446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Part of my job was to write browser notifications so that my coworkers can be automatically notified of employee guidelines and company policies while they surf the web She needs to understand this power isn't her own to wield. And the risk of people abusing power to advance their personal agenda is NOT something that would get passed easily once discovered.

It's so disingenuous to call out employees advancing their agenda when the corporations themselves are constantly abusing their power to advance their agenda. > And the risk of people abusing power to advance their personal agenda is NOT something that would get passed easily once discovered. Yes, it is. It get discovered all the time and no one gives a sh*t about it.

Um, not disingenuous. See, the company isn't funded nor owned nor managed by its employees. So it's not "abuse" and it is completely legitimate, even a mandate, and a fiduciary duty that compels companies advance their agenda. A corporation MUST take these kinds of actions, it isn't even legal for them not to, let alone abuse.

Conversely, an employee's agenda can be left at home, please, if they agree to be employed. The "Engineer" is lucky she isn't brought up on misuse of computing system charges.

I don't like companies that invade employees and customers outside-of-work freedoms. Just as I don't like employees that abuse and undermine the relationship that they freely entered with their employers. If you don't like it - quit and go work somewhere else. Then become activist.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#715

Post by _y5hn » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:28 AM UTC

anarchodev wrote: post #592

scarmig wrote: post #579

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sympathetic to this. But the fact that it's a security tool being misused is what I think made for the very harsh reaction. Two scenarios: A) Rogue employee messages a bunch of internal email lists about having the right to organize B) Rogue employee configures a security extension to issue a popup saying "Happy Birthday Sundar!" every time an employee visits google.com on June 10. I am confident that A) wouldn't…

It's incredible watching tech people in this thread assert that she wasn't fired for union agitation but if she was, that's okay too because she should have known not to be "inflammatory."

We don't have all info on this though. Maybe there were more to it. If not, it follows US workplace culture and is unfortunate.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#716

Post by fargle » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:36 AM UTC

geofft wrote: post #656

scarmig wrote: post #622

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, let's walk through the reasoning here. Data is simultaneously Google's greatest strength and its biggest liability. If an employee uploads data to a not-known-to-be-secure third party, it can literally cost Google billions of dollars depending on the data locality. Or, it could plausibly cause a severe security breach (if e.g. an employee uploads a security token into a third party decoder). And so the security t…

I'm not disputing that, but that still really doesn't seem like a fireable offense. I'm objecting to the fact that she got fired for it after (presumably) making the change through appropriate channels. There are always appropriate channels to roll back a good-faith change, too. If you could concisely and cogently explain why this change is a bad idea in an HN comment, surely someone can do that in response to the ch…

Even in california, it's the companies choice what a "fireable" offense is, not the employee, nor what social media thinks "seems fireable". If you violate any company policy, or even if google does not think you are performing, you can quite legally be fired. There is very little chance of any recourse.

Don't misunderstand, it's not that I'm really trying to defend google. This is to serve as a reality check and warning to those who don't understand the rules of employment. And I'm guessing the Engineer in question understood the risk full well.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#717

Post by _y5hn » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:38 AM UTC

dokein wrote: post #667

shadowgovt wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Googlers are encouraged---well, in the past, have been encouraged---to consider themselves capable of making judgement calls like this one. That having been said, this would still be considered an unusual call to have made. But had I been on the receiving end of this message, I suspect I'd have found it annoying unless she remembered to suppress it after first display---if she had, I wouldn't have been bothered by it…

Part of being encouraged to exercise personal judgment is being responsible enough to participate in the consequences. Judgment with no/few personal consequences is reserved for children and legislators.

Getting fired is encouragement to you? Why would anyone input any value if having no platform to excercise judgement calls? 2/3 of typical decisions are either wrong or neutral..

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#718

Post by fargle » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:42 AM UTC

SilasX wrote: post #642

scarmig wrote: post #622

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, let's walk through the reasoning here. Data is simultaneously Google's greatest strength and its biggest liability. If an employee uploads data to a not-known-to-be-secure third party, it can literally cost Google billions of dollars depending on the data locality. Or, it could plausibly cause a severe security breach (if e.g. an employee uploads a security token into a third party decoder). And so the security t…

Agreed -- so under my rubric, if Google were consistently firing people for all off-topic messages slipped into the security UX, then that would be a non-political firing. But if they came down harder on "oh don't forget NLRB" than "Happy Birthday, Sundar", then that seems political and "fired for notifying co-workers..." seems accurate. (I don't know enough of the history of Google's firings and this kind of violati…

It doesn't matter if it's "political" or not. It's completely 100% google management's choice whether the punishment for a serious (or tiny) rule infraction is anything from no action at all to firing. There is no rule that says it has to be consistent either.

You can't fire a worker for organizing, or on the basis of sex, race, etc. But you CAN fire whoever you want for breaking even the most minor rules or even just poor performance. And the choice can be as politically motivated as google likes, doesn't change a thing.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#719

Post by sundayedition » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:46 AM UTC

cj wrote: post #5

> Kathryn Spiers, who worked as a security engineer, updated an internal Chrome browser extension so that each time Google employees visited the website of IRI Consultants — the Troy, Michigan, firm that Google hired this year amid a groundswell of labor activism at the company — they would see a pop-up message that read: “Googlers have the right to participate in protected concerted activities.” So basically, the Go…

I think there's a piece that some people are overlooking. There are very specific statutory protections about when, where, and how you have a right to organize.

Things that would likely require legal review and Google has the budget to test the waters of at this point.

The last clause in the link below pertains to this scenario, I think, which may bite Google. Or it may not because it all depends on case law and what union leadership is willing to push back on (which could take years to sort out via legal proceedings)

Really, at the end of the day all Google has to risk via this kind of behavior is some lawyer time, setting precedent, and potentially being required to post a notice if they end up losing.

Source: https://www.nlrb.gov/rights-we-protect/whats-law/employees/i...

> Working time is for work, so your employer may maintain and enforce non-discriminatory rules limiting solicitation and distribution, except that your employer cannot prohibit you from talking about or soliciting for a union during non-work time, such as before or after work or during break times; or from distributing union literature during non-work time, in non-work areas, such as parking lots or break rooms. Also, restrictions on your efforts to communicate with co-workers cannot be discriminatory. For example, your employer cannot prohibit you from talking about the union during working time if it permits you to talk about other non-work-related matters during working time.

Re: Engineer says Google fired her for notifying co-workers of right to organize

#720

Post by fargle » Wed, Dec 18, 2019, 5:55 AM UTC

KirinDave wrote: post #691

ticmasta wrote: post #607

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only because you brought it up, someone in the typing pool likely has more education and experience: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kathryn-spiers-1b3048a1/ By any measure she's not an engineer.

She's got a CompTia Security+ certification. That is not a trivial amount of specialist education. You certainly aren't expected to have a college degree to be an "engineer" if that's the thrust of your argument. Tbh it sounds like other ulterior motives are clouding your judgement here. She seems like exactly the sort of engineer who would benefit from unionization and while I might need it less, I fully support her…

A CompTia Security+ cert is actually pretty trivial. It's complete regurgitation, and not even of industry standard best practices, but of CompTia defined "best" practices. It's the lowest and most basic tech cert you can get. It certainly isn't evidence of any engineering discipline.

The board and shareholders will have to decide whether this action was, or was not, in their best interests. But history has shown that Wall Street would generally agree with this one. It's certainly not a "massive" liability. Should the employee prevail, years from now, in a wrongful termination suit the cost to google will be trivial compared to the employee.

That's why other companies often flagrantly intentionally ignore NLRB protections. It's a very limited civil liability with a very high burden of proof on the employee.